A theme! A theme! My kingdom for a theme!

[Ruddertail]

First of all, what is the purpose of a theme? As I see it, a theme as two purposes.

To make people feel like they're actually leading an empire, not just manipulating values in a data base.

To attract people. To make people who've never heard of promi games or FAF think "hey, this sounds cool."

While our current theme probably fulfills the first purpose, I'd say it generally fails at the second. Let's face it - most of the people who might play a game like this don't think history is really that cool, and most of the people who are enthused with history don't have the time or the interest to play online, text based, turn based games only loosely based on history.

So. The question we should be asking in deciding whether to keep our theme or change it is this: Are there other themes that will make more people, seeing just a brief add, a Youtube vid, a Myspace page, say, "Hey, this sounds cool"? If so, we should consider adopting such. If not, well, we just need to increase publicity.

So - Are there better themes? If so, what? Don't be afraid to just throw stuff out there, even if you don't know if it'd be better or worse. Just brainstorm, then we can analyze.

My thoughts - Yes, there are probably better themes. Ideas? Perhaps political satire of some sort (I.e, races named after liberal/conservative personalities - Rush Limbaugh, Michael Moor, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush - we'd have to pick on each side equally, of course - or else stuff we find generally irritating about government/politics in general), something to do with Lord Of The Rings, or maybe Star Wars. Just ideas/brainstorms, let me know if they're good, and add your own.)

[maddog]

hmmmmmm starwars could prove ineresting as their was plenty of alien races or even star trek even the polictal satire could be interesting however if could easily offend someone, i hate to think of a fatwah ( excuse spelling ) being issued to wards the staff though

[carbz]

First of all, what is the purpose of a theme? As I see it, a theme as two purposes.

To make people feel like they're actually leading an empire, not just manipulating values in a data base.

To attract people. To make people who've never heard of promi games or FAF think "hey, this sounds cool."

While our current theme probably fulfills the first purpose, I'd say it generally fails at the second. Let's face it - most of the people who might play a game like this don't think history is really that cool, and most of the people who are enthused with history don't have the time or the interest to play online, text based, turn based games only loosely based on history.

So. The question we should be asking in deciding whether to keep our theme or change it is this: Are there other themes that will make more people, seeing just a brief add, a Youtube vid, a Myspace page, say, "Hey, this sounds cool"? If so, we should consider adopting such. If not, well, we just need to increase publicity.

So - Are there better themes? If so, what? Don't be afraid to just throw stuff out there, even if you don't know if it'd be better or worse. Just brainstorm, then we can analyze.

My thoughts - Yes, there are probably better themes. Ideas? Perhaps political satire of some sort (I.e, races named after liberal/conservative personalities - Rush Limbaugh, Michael Moor, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush - we'd have to pick on each side equally, of course - or else stuff we find generally irritating about government/politics in general), something to do with Lord Of The Rings, or maybe Star Wars. Just ideas/brainstorms, let me know if they're good, and add your own.)

what do you mean manipulating the values in a database, this is real isnt it?

I like the lord of the rings theme, it will attract peopel into fanmtasy. Star wars is all well and good but those kinda dudes are more into films, whereas you need to be appealing to the war gaming / pasty faced dungeons and dragons types.

LOTR will definitely attract people.

[avatar of vengeance]

Hmm, a good theme that attract people...
What about lord of the rings?

EDIT: I had heard of several text based games, but I actually hated it, I never tried one. Then I was searching for fire emblem, than I found FEE, I took the time to get it... And it was hell addictive!

A theme is the best way to attract people, it have to be from something popular...
Several themes you can do:
Advance Wars
Mario
Zelda
Lord of the Rings (hmm, mayby it's used too much allready)
Starwars(don't do this theme, it's used far too much)
Naruto (too much used I think)
Bleach
One Piece
Pokemon (*laughs*)

[Shadow I]

Let's try to stay away from the clichés. I actually really like the theme we have now.

[avatar of vengeance]

I think lotr is the best idea, or you have to make the game more roman that it will be more clear. I still have the feeling that I am playing with african empires

EDIT: I definatly keep playing this game if it has a lotr theme.

[Shadow I]

I'd probably quit if it was lotr. i hate overused pop culture symbols, no matter how good the books were

[carbz]

I'd probably quit if it was lotr. i hate overused pop culture symbols, no matter how good the books were

ahhh i dont think youd quit, esp not if loads of new people joined!

i agree re overused pop culture, and the books were good, but im thinking the genre has market appeal no doubt.

[avatar of vengeance]

Than you just play RWL, it's over animals.

[Shadow I]

at least it's original :*laughs*:

[Ruddertail]

Shadow - the problem with the theme as it is is that it isn't something that really ties into something, or draws people. RWL and FAF's ancestors, the Warbands games, tied in to Redwall. It may not have been an "overused pop culture symbol", but it was established, and something that had name recognition and a fan base. Further, there were plenty of Redwall fansites. You could go to one of those sites, advertise, and people would think, "Hey, a Redwall game. That sounds cool." And they'd come check it out and play, because it was Redwall related.

That's how RWL got so many people initially. The Redwall online community. That's how I found FAF, or, at that time, Warbands II. It was linked to The Sword of Redwall, which was affiliated with the Mossflower Patrol, a Redwall club I was active in.

The unfortunate thing is, there's no "history online community", or if there is something of that nature, it's a scholarly organization, not the kind of thing that will have a lot of people who might play games because they're related to history. History, interesting and inventive as it might be to some of us, doesn't have the kind of widespread draw we may want. Especially not this period. The periods that inspire people come later, I think. The Roman period is cool, Alexander is cool. Some of the Feudal stuff might be cool. Napoleonic wars era, or pre WWI era might be cool. But I'm betting most people have never heard of half our races, and I'm not sure a history themed game sounds all that great to most people.

So, yeah. I agree, we don't really want something that's totally cliched. On the other hand, we want something with some name appeal. Redwall had it at one point, though I don't think it does so much anymore. History... well, I don't think it really does.

[bjornredtail]

I somewhat disagree... Look at all the folks that play Civilization, Age of Empires, Stronghold.

[Shadow I]

I somewhat disagree... Look at all the folks that play Civilization, Age of Empires, Stronghold.

you can out that down to the pretty graphics and storyline

if we could work a rpg type story into the tutorial it would work wonders, i think. perhaps a tutorial server with enemies all set up exactly so that we can lead them through turn by turn to see the basics?

a lot of work i know, but well worth it if it works.

[Freenhult]

Hah. Anime, horrible idea.

No. We need a fantasy theme. LoTRs is good, but lets not go there unless we have too. I propose we actually LOOK at other proms that are doing well and see what they have in common.

[Shadow I]

Hah. Anime, horrible idea.

No. We need a fantasy theme. LoTRs is good, but lets not go there unless we have too. I propose we actually LOOK at other proms that are doing well and see what they have in common.

any of you ever read "the wheel of time" series by robert jordan? It has a huge following, and the books are actually really good IMO. might be a good theme. There are hundreds of fan sites, I'm sure